All The Camp's a Stage
by not Ross
Summary: Step 1: greet antisocial band geek and fall on face. Step 2: sing a song for a guy who morphs into a monster. Step 3: get rescued by a goat woman who carries a really sharp knife in her designer belt. Could a person's day get any weirder? Details inside!
1. 1: American Idol Gone Haywire

_(Author's note: This is my first fanfiction ever, and I really hope you like it. It's supposed to take place between Sea of Monsters and The Titan's Curse, so that's why things are a little different than the way they ended up after The Lost Hero. I'm not really sure how the whole copyrighting thing works yet, so I am basically going to say that Kim and Glee are my characters because I have their character outlines sitting right next to me, and the whole idea behind this is Rick Riordan's masterminding because he is just that cool. Okay, read on! ~not Ross)_

**Chapter 1**

So I hadn't planned on falling flat on my face before I had even introduced myself. Things just worked out that way.

Early in September, the Community Youth Theatre Association decided to host their own Teen American Idol, in response to the popularity of a certain reality show. When I got the email explaining what it was about, I ran down the hallway screaming. My mom signed me up right away. Three weeks later, I was clicking my high heels nervously against the cracking linoleum floor of the high school. Everyone else looked about four years older than me.

"Mom," I hissed, "I think I'm sweating my makeup off."

"You're not," she assured me.

"Number thirty-six," called the Ryan Seacrest equivalent. Sort of. If you consider an underdressed band geek to be like Ryan Seacrest.

For the millionth time, I fiddled with the paper number pinned to the front of my shirt. Thirty-seven. I tried to breathe. _Come on. This is just like the audition for _Oklahoma!_ And _Thoroughly Modern Millie._ And _Bye-Bye, Birdie._ And—_

"Thirty-seven."

Now, I was used to clacking high heels and all that, even tap shoes, but I wondered if my mom had glued a lifetime supply of Doritos to the bottoms of my shoes as I clopped up to the door. Did they have any shoed horses I could ride to be more discreet?

"Good luck," the band geek muttered. I didn't know people actually taped their glasses together like that. "But care-"

I hauled the door open, took two steps forward, and then gravity suctioned my face to the floor.

"Tried to tell ya," he shrugged before slamming the door shut.

"Are you okay?" one of the judges shrieked. She clicked over to where I was still laying on the ground – she must have been wearing heels, too, though I couldn't see beneath her floor-lengthed dress. Good. Then it wasn't just me. "There was nowhere else to put that wire, I'm so sorry!"

"Just fine," I mumbled, picking myself up slowly. "I should be used to walking in heels by now."

"Can we just get on with this?" another judge groaned. "Two more and we can have lunch."

"Oh, shut up," the third snapped. "Are uplifting words not in your vocabulary, is that it?" He turned to look at me. "I'm Vince, that over there is Glee, and this is Simon." He pointed to the judge who wanted lunch.

I snorted. "Is your name really Simon?"

"No, I just enjoy being likened to the most annoying person on television."

"Oh…"

"Just ignore him," Glee said. "What are you singing for us today?"

"Um… 'I Could Have Danced All Night' from _My Fair Lady_."

"I love that song!" she applauded.

"I find it rather boring, actually," Simon complained.

"Just go ahead and sing…" Vince scanned down his list, "…Kimberly."

I cleared my throat and began to sing. I've always like that song because it always reminds me of the feeling I get after closing night of a show – _"Sleep, sleep, I couldn't go to sleep."_ Couldn't go to sleep? Ha! I once tried to shimmy up my bedroom wall after a show.

Just as I reached the chorus, Simon's nose began to elongate.

After having been through more than several disastrous theatrical incidents in my life, I tried to ignore it. After all, having Pinocchio judging my singing was probably even better than having hungry Simon doing so (and definitely not as bad as the brown paint and bananas situation a few months before). Instead, I tried to focus on Glee, because she was a lot better to look at than Vince. But she looked even more preoccupied than I felt.

By the time the second verse began, Simon jumped out of his seat, and I screamed. While I was avoiding his lengthening nose, he had transformed from a moody judge to some kind of monster-under-the-bed. Only not under the bed. Maybe a pig? A pig with gray fur and a figure the size of my mom's Civic?

"Get behind me, Kimberly," Glee screeched, running to protect me.

"Is this some kinda…"

Vince screamed and dashed towards the door, but Simon-the-pig-thing blocked his route, snarling.

Glee shoved me behind her, yelling, "Vince, don't look at it! Get underneath a desk!"

"What is that thing?" Vince stammered. Simon lurked by the door.

"It's a _katoblepones_. Very dangerous."

"A what the heck?"

Simon leveled his eyes and sauntered towards Glee and me again. I was beginning to think more _cow_ than pig, but what did I know about barnyard animals? We had used cardboard boxes, foam poster-board, and cotton balls to make sheep for _Oklahoma!_ "Kimberly, do _not_, under _any_ circumstance, look into his eyes."

"Why?" I stuttered.

"To give you the short version, it'll kill you."

"What is he, Medusa's golden retriever?"

"It's a little different than that."

Simon, a Medusa's best friend, raised his long, saggy snout to look at us. Glee slapped her hand over my face, and I fell backwards because of my heels, hitting the linoleum hard. Simon growled excitedly.

Glee pulled me to my feet and whispered, "All you have to do is close your eyes and hold your breath, okay?"

"Why?"

"I'll explain later. Just trust me."

It seemed simple enough to trust a woman named after a feeling of jubilation – unless, of course, she turned into a unicorn or something. I gulped in air and held it, clenched my eyes shut, and stumbled around the room blindly as Glee dragged me on a very indirect route to a wall. I could hear Simon jumping and growling and snorting, trying to get us. My lungs began to feel like a Valentine's Day balloon in June: deflating and forgotten. Glee shoved me through an open window (at least, that's what it felt like), and I slammed into the middle of one of those drought-resistant succulents that crunches and oozes plant juice everywhere.

"Wait just a minute, Kimberly!" she shouted. I eventually gave in to my lungs and quickly re-inflated them. More growling and what sounded like Vince screaming erupted from the other side of the window, followed by a quiet *piff* like the sound a snowball makes when you throw it at your mom's ear when you're skiing at Mamoth. I kept my eyes vacuumed shut. "Okay, she panted, landing lightly on the ground next to me.

I dared to look up, and I immediately regretted it. "Aaaagh!" I shrieked. Glee stood before me, but she had hiked up her long peasant dress to reveal two legs a whole lot hairier than forgetting to shave for a few weeks.

"Calm down," she told me.

"I don't think so! I knew talent competition judges could be harsh, but no one told me that they spontaneously turn into anteaters and… huskies!"

"_Katoblepones_ and satyrs, actually," she corrected.

"My version is easier to say. I'm out of here!"

"That you are, my friend." She grabbed my shoulder and held me back. "But not back to your house. You can be sure there will be more monsters there."

"Monsters? Where, under my bed?"

"Like Simon, and no."

"Fine, then what about my mom? How's _she_ going to protect herself?"

"They're not interested in mortals. They're here for you."

As if to imply that I was not a mortal? _Oh, surprise! You're actually a goddess, so you may want to stop wasting your time in school_. Yeah, sure. "I'm really lost… Look, I just want to go home. Or wake up. Or whatever."

"We all do. Now, if you'll excuse me for a moment." She turned her back to me, and I saw a gold dagger hanging from her very fashionable woven leather belt.

"Woah," I said. "Is that a knife?"

"Sh!"

I tried to process what had just happened. Step 1: greet antisocial band geek and fall on face. Step 2: sing a song for a guy who morphs into a monster. Step 3: get rescued by a goat woman who carries a really sharp knife in her designer belt. Could a person's day get any weirder?

"Dude."

"Dude!"

"Hello, boys."

"Hey, dude."

"Duu-ude! You're not planning on wearing those heels all the way to Long Island, are you?"

"Long Island?" I turned around and, yet again, shrieked. "What is- Are those- I…"

"Pegasi, yes ma'am," Glee announced. "And you might want to take off your shoes."

"Dude, yes," one of the Pegasi nodded emphatically. "I mean, dude, have you ever been ridden by someone wearing heels? Not cool, man, not cool."

"Oh, snap, dude."

"I don't feel very good…" I mumbled, kicking off my shoes numbly.

"I know, dear," Glee said. "Just kick back and let these bad boys do the work, okay?"

"Dude!" one of them grinned.

Glee helped me up onto one of their backs, and I slumped forward, overwhelmed.

"Uh, listen, dude…" said my Pegasus. "Seats in the upright position for take-off and landing, you know? Dude, haven't you ever flown before?"

The only things I remember after that are the wind flipping my hair in every possible direction and a very off-key rendition of 'Bohemian Rhapsody' sung by our flight crew themselves.


	2. 2: That Kid Eats Soda Cans?

_(Author's note: yes, I know, impossible! I already posted chapter two. But as I typed more, I realized that the better chapter break was further in, hence, the replaced chapter. Probably around the second half of it is new, so… yeah! Sorry about that. ~not Ross)_

"Dude, this is your captain speaking." That woke me up. I jerked awake and sat up, and when I realized that the ground that would normally have tumbled unwillingly onto was hundreds of feet below me, I screamed. The hors- _Pegasus_ beneath me protested and wobbled.

"Dude, I told you that was a bad idea," the other Pegasus chided.

Then I remembered why I was flying on the back of a mythical flying horse next to a goat woman four hundred feet higher than my usual altitude. Monsters. "Huh?" I mumbled.

My Pegasus cleared his throat dramatically. "Dude, take two. This is your totally awesome captain speaking. We're gonna land soon, so if you would your seats in the upright position, fasten your seatbelts, and close your drink trays, that'd be totally chill, and thanks for flying with, uh… me."

"Fasten my seatbelt?" I repeated groggily. Glee demonstrated how to wrap my hands around the mane of my Pegasus to get a solid grip. "Oh."

"Dude!" her Pegasus warned. "Easy on the hair. Just got it fixed up, you know?"

I closed my eyes and ground my teeth till they were tightly clamped together. We barreled towards the ground. The pegasi tucked in their wings and zoomed towards a grassy patch below us like rather un-chill birds of prey. We hit the ground hard, and I bounced onto the grass. I seemed to be doing a lot of that lately.

"Duu-ude!" my Pegasus rejoiced. "Intense!"

"Total epic-ness," the other agreed.

Glee jumped to the ground and helped me to my feet. "Thank you for your services, boys." The pegasi did some kind of variation of a fist bump, only with their noses. Then they pranced away. "Welcome to Camp Half-Blood, Kimberly."

"Kim," I corrected. "Camp what? Do you harbor more Jacuzzi-sized anteaters here?"

Glee sighed. "_Katoblepones_. Somewhat related to the bull. It can kill anyone with its gaze or with its poisonous breath. And this camp is actually designed to avoid creatures like that."

"Medusa's golden retriever," I repeated. "Bad breath and everything."

"I'm not entirely sure about the relationship between Medusa and the _katoblepones_…"

"But Medusa is just one of those things! You know, like Jack the Ripper, or the Sandman, or Little Boy Blue, or-"

"Well, I hate to break it to you, but you couldn't be more wrong. Not about Little Boy Blue, but about Medusa. In fact, one of our campers killed her at the beginning of last summer."

"But-"

Glee held up her finger as a signal to be quiet. "Just be patient. It'll make sense soon."

"Why does that feel like an overused bad premonition in movies and musicals?"

"Probably because it is."

I sighed and let my chin fall against my chest. "Wait, where are my shoes?"

"I think you dropped them somewhere between Houston and New Orleans."

"Houston and New Orleans?"

"To be honest, I wasn't really paying much attention."

"So… I guess that means we're not in California anymore?"

"Welcome to Long Island!"

"I think I need to sit down."

"No time. The camp director, Mr. D, wants to see you."

"How could I possibly have done anything wrong? I only just got here, like, two minutes ago!"

Glee rolled her eyes. "Ever since Clarisse complained that he was so mean, he's been trying to welcome new campers with unwillingly open arms."

"Who's Clarisse?"

"One of the Ares kids."

"Who's Ares?"

"Greek god of war."

"So the kid of a god of war complained that this guy was too harsh?"

"Indeed."

"Oh boy…" Something very obvious dawned upon me. "Wait, first Medusa, now Greek gods of war? This is one heck of a joke."

The sky rumbled like thunder, but when I looked up, the sun was still shining. Glee cringed. "You may want to be careful saying things like that. Zeus is pretty easy to tick off."

"_Zeus_? Okay, ha-ha, real funny. I'm leaving."

She caught my arm. "Just come to see Mr. D with me, okay?"

"Fine, fine." I followed her across the grass, past a large cluster of weirdly decorated clubhouses or something, and up onto the porch of a big yellow house. Three more goat kids stumbled up the steps behind us, grunting under the weight of a cardboard box that cautioned, "FRAGILE" in big, gold letters on the side. Glee let them go inside ahead of us."

"Over there," said a large man, directing the goat kids to a corner of the room. "There are… nails and things."

"Mr. D," Glee interrupted, "I have a new camper."

"And…?" He sat down in a large, rolling desk chair, leaned back, and propped his feet up on his desk. I had no clue that men his age still wore leather sandals.

"Sir…" are

"Ah! Yes, right, the friendly campaign. Welcome to Camp Half-Blood, enjoy your stay, goodbye. Alfred, what you _doing_?"

"Mr. D," Glee protested.

"Yes, Mr. D?" asked the goat kid who I assumed was Alfred. He looked more nervous than a fourth grader about to sing "Phantom of the Opera" in front of a million people.

"With that picture of Zeus, what are you doing with it?"

"Putting it on the wall, sir!"

Mr. D let out an exasperated sigh and dragged to his feet. "No, Alfred, no. All I was told is to hang the pictures on the wall. No one said where. So I am _not_ putting Zeus' picture right in the middle of my office where every passer-by can glory in it!"

"Then, sir, where should I hang it?"

"In the attic."

"Sir?"

"Fine, fine. I'd hate to be chained here for another hundred years. Can you imagine? A hundred more years stuck with immature children who don't know the first thing about respect! Of course, maybe he'd just blast me to Tartarus; put me out of my misery."

Alfred hesitated. "I'll put it in the corner."

"Mr. D, what are the pictures for?" Glee asked.

"Zeus' latest whim. 'Pictures! Familiarize the campers with their godly parents!' If they really wanted that, they'd take these brats off my hands and build their own summer camps."

"Mr. D?" Alfred interrupted again.

"What?" Mr. D snapped.

"There's only eleven pictures here. Zeus… Hermes with Martha and George… Ares and his motorcycle… Demeter with-"

"Oh, right. Aphrodite insisted she was having a bad hair day and flatly refused to have her picture taken. Said she'd do it herself – two weeks ago. They're working on that one."

"Mr. D," Glee tried again, "really."

"Well, what do you want me to say, anyhow? Tell Clarisse that her idea is being abandoned. Go… climb the climbing wall or something."

"Sir, I have a meeting with the naiads this afternoon, as you'll recall. Something about the Hepheastus kids using the lake water to speed up the cooling process of their metalworking, I think?"

"Blast." Mr. D collapsed back into his chair and put his head in his hands. "Alfred!" he snapped wearily. "Show this girl around, will you? Take a Coke can for your troubles. Ah- trouble." He carelessly tossed an empty soda can across the room.

Alfred dove onto the floor to catch it. "Yes, sir. Come on, camper who I don't know the name of yet."

I glanced at Glee warily, but she nodded for me to follow the younger goat kid outside. So, I did.

"So," Alfred began. He seemed very relieved to be out of Mr. D's office. Or house. Or whatever it was, "what's your name?"

"Kim. Kim Kurir. What's the soda can for? Do you collect the top thingies or something?"

He shoved half the can into his mouth and ripped a big chunk out of it. "No. Do people do that?"

I thought I was going to be sick. "A lot more people than eat them, that's for sure…"

The metal scraped against his teeth and made a spine-tingling, fingernails on a chalkboard kind of sound. "I'm a satyr, can't you tell? I tend to think Squirt cans taste better, but Coke's pretty high on the list."

"I have no idea what a satyr is."

"Half man, half goat."

"I'm officially the most confused person in the universe right now."

"That's why Mr. D told me to show you around."

Alfred began walking away towards the rest of the camp. He started in on a long speech about Greek gods, monsters, some guy named Kronos, quests, orange t-shirts, capture the flag, some kind of "Great Prophecy," a kid named Percy, sword fighting, camp-fires, half-siblings, and a bunch of other stuff I can't even remember. He took me on an endless walk around, showing me a lake, the woods, a volcano (weird, right, that they would have a volcano that actually shoots lava in the middle of a summer camp? It's not just me?), and some other things, all dotted with kids in orange t-shirts that matched his. They were running around waving lethal weapons at each other. Not your average summer camp, because these lethal weapons, unlike the ones we had used in _The Pirates of Penzance_, were not made out of cardboard. He ended the tour standing in front of a big, U-shaped cluster of weirdly decorated cabins. And when I say weirdly, I do mean _weirdly_. I saw one that looked like a grape juice advertisement, one that resembled a five year old's princess dress-up box, one that I was pretty sure belonged tacked to the back of a homeless guy's minivan, and one painted the same color as the seventies chandelier at my grandma's house. Then I spotted one covered with fishing nets, sea shells, starfish, sand dollars, sand, and even a surfboard. I brightened up. Hey, I am a California girl.

"Is there room in that one?" I asked, pointing to my own little beach resort.

Alfred paled. "Kim! Haven't you been listening to me?"

"Sure," I lied. "What were you talking about?" Surprisingly, I had almost gotten over the fact that I was talking to a kid with little horns and goat legs. Not that I'm into analyzing guys' legs or anything.

He sighed. "_That_ is the Poseidon cabin. You stay there if you're a child of Poseidon."

"And he's the ocean guy, right?"

"Yeah."

"Yep, that's me."

"Kim!" Alfred complained. "It's not like that! You weren't paying attention, were you?" He said it almost like he actually believed I had been. "A god claims you, so you stay in their cabin, no questions asked."

"So… what about, like, Artemis or something? She sounded pretty cool." To be honest, that was one of the only names I remembered from the introductory speech.

He blushed. "She's a chronic maiden. Not into the whole dating scene, much less the having kids with random people scene."

"Man! Can I stay in _any_ of these, or do I have to sleep in the volcano?"

"Climbing wall," Alfred corrected. "It just spews lava."

"Oh, is that all?"

"It seems like you're a little bitter about all this."

"Oh, not at all!" I heard myself start to sound like Simon before he turned into the giant, poison breathing anteater, but by that point, I didn't much care. "Of course I am! What about my friends in California? What about my life back there? You think I just sat in my house all the time steaming up the windows and thinking, 'Gosh, I wish I could get attacked by a monster with really bad breath so that a goat woman can kidnap me and fly me all the way to Long Island to a camp where the kids run around chasing each other with spears! Wouldn't that be awesome?'"

"Is that one of those rhetorical questions? Because if it's not, you're going to need to speak about ten times slow-"

"Whatever. I'm over this. I'm going to get back to California somehow." I swirled around and stalked back towards the big yellow house Glee had taken me to. Beyond it was a big hill that looked like it might lead to someplace where my peers didn't consume both the contents and the container of a can of Coke.

"Kim, wait!" Alfred called, trotting behind me. Fortunately, the basic athleticism required in any good performer was enough to outrun a goat.

Near the top of the hill, the grass got thicker, and I had to slow down to wade through it all. I checked behind me to make sure Alfred wasn't still stalking me. He wasn't. I was almost about to start down the hill when someone asked, "Where are you going?"

I turned around until I spotted the source of the voice. Now, I'll admit that I had not seen much of the world when I was thirteen (according to Glee, my high heels had probably seen more of the world than me), so the sight of one of those legit Goths almost freaked me out. It might have, too, except for the whole satyr, Pegasus, exploding climbing wall thing. That kind of numbs a person to weird-looking people. Black hair, ripped black jeans, a black t-shirt featuring some screaming rock singer I'd never heard of, and eyeliner so black I almost thought she had smeared tar all over her face. The hair was an interesting touch, too. She didn't really look like a camper, so I was thinking, _Look! Someone normal!_ about a goth. "Away. Have you been down there?" I pointed to the valley, full of little orange gnats.

"I've been up here more than I've been down there."

"Huh? Are you one of the campers?"

"I am now. And I was supposed to be a long time ago. And for the five years in between, I was a tree."

"Um…" Again, that might have sounded a lot stranger if I hadn't flown all the way across the country on a winged horse that morning.

"Sounds crazy, doesn't it?"

I sighed. "No crazier than anything else I've heard today… or seen."

"You must be new. If you don't know who I am."

"Either new or about to be the victim of the biggest practical joke in history. Why, who are you?"

"Thalia. Daughter of Zeus."

The sky rumbled again. "Isn't Zeus, like, shot-caller?"

"You got it. And stupid Kronos knows it."

Since I was planning on leaving, I didn't bother to ask who Kronos was. "Well, I'm leaving. So, bye, Thalia daughter of Zeus."

"So, you're just going to leave?"

"Don't you have friends outside of this place? Didn't you have a life?"

"Hard to tell… Being a tree kinda takes it all out of you."

"I wouldn't know."

"Just give this place a shot. I mean, what could it hurt? So far, it's just like going on vacation, right? Plus, this is the only vacation destination where you get to chase people around with maces."

"But, what about my life? I'm an actress, and I can't just… leave."

"Some kids just come here for the summer. They probably just had to get you out of some sticky situation. You'll probably get to go back."

I groaned.

"Out there," Thalia pointed to the other side of the hill, "there's just a lot more monsters." She stared across the land for a while. "A lot of monsters," she mumbled finally.

"Kim!" Alfred's voice yelled. He bounded up the hill. Maybe he was half mountain goat – literally. "Don't go down the hill! There's-"

"Chill, Freddie," Thalia said. "I covered that."

Alfred blushed. "Got it… Um, Kim, Connor and Travis from the Hermes cabin want to talk to you. Like, right now."

"Hermes?"

"That's where you're going to sleep for now. As the god of travelers, he welcomes people with nowhere else to go."

I stared mournfully down the hill to a road that I wished could take me all the way back to California. "Yeah, that's me. Nowhere else to go."


End file.
